


Do You Remember

by livrelibre



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: F/F, Harvard Era, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-08-08 01:15:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7737373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livrelibre/pseuds/livrelibre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Annalise and Eve at the beginning</p>
            </blockquote>





	Do You Remember

**Author's Note:**

  * For [raz0rgirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raz0rgirl/gifts).



> Many thanks to thingswithwings for the beta (all mistakes my own)!

Eve would toss these memories out, not like bait but still a lure, a golden thread that caught Annalise every time. Annalise, who had gotten so good at not looking back and at bricking up the past behind a wall, couldn’t resist her reminiscences, no matter how hard she tried. “Remember dancing all night at that Brazilian place? Remember that time in the library parking lot when Prof Carson walked by? Remember those dinner parties at Al’s?” Eve would say and everything came streaming back.

 

***

 

That first party at Al’s wasn’t the first time she noticed Eve; it was just the first time she realized this thing between them was going to be a Thing. A thing besides challenging each other in classes and study groups, besides competing for the top of everything at Harvard Law. Oh, Annalise had noticed Eve all right. In the sea of anxious strivers, shooting stars, and moneyed windbags in her class who never expected to fall before her (whose surprised and annoyed expressions she lived on as much as coffee), Eve was pretty much the only one right there with her, cutting through the competition--no, being her only real competition--making her better, lighting her up, taking as much satisfaction as she did in winning, in being as smart and ruthless as they came. 

 

What Annalise hadn’t realized until that night at Al’s was how much Eve still lit her up even when it wasn’t about the law. When Al, who she’d met when she first arrived in Cambridge at one of the black grad student association functions, invited her over, he’d sworn that it mostly just a small, casual Thanksgiving party with his friends who were left in town. Annalise, unwilling to go home and deal with the chaos of her family--all calling her Anna Mae and poking her about having gotten all sadity at Hahvard--and unable to pay for a trip before Christmas anyway, had figured on staying in her tiny apartment for Chinese food and contract law, but when it came down to it, unaccountably homesick in the gray and rainy November, she’d thrown on her coat and gone over at the promise of sweet potato, pumpkin _and_ pecan pie done right. 

 

Annalise had spotted Eve first thing and nearly turned right back around. The last thing she needed was law school talk or a reminder of why she should have been studying, but Eve just tipped her a nod and went back to chatting with a tall Chinese woman who, Annalise noted as she greeted Al and filled her plate, was not being nearly as casual as she thought she was with her little touches to Eve’s arm. But Annalise couldn’t even blame her, she guessed, if you went in for that sort of thing. Eve, not just model pretty but also radiating intelligence and intensity, did have a way of drawing the eye. I mean here Annalise was, determined not to talk to her but still distracted by Eve’s laugh over the party hum, reluctantly amused by her skillful brush off her conversational partner, aware almost against her will of Eve’s red head in the corner of her eye even as she caught up with Al. Her distraction didn’t go unnoticed, it turned out.

 

“Friend of yours?” Al asked with a pointed arch of an eyebrow. Honestly, his talent for heavy implication by expression was a gift.

 

“No, I’m not you. You know I only have enemies I haven’t made yet. More like wannabe rival.” But that was an inadequate description for how Eve made her feel, how just being around her got Annalise’s blood up and made her feel sharper, challenged, seen, alive. She hated it and loved it in equal measure. 

 

“Ah, nemeses! Well, you picked well at least. And it’s a thin line. . “ 

 

Annalise sucked her teeth, feeling her face heat. “It’s not that serious and it’s not like that.”

 

“Mmm hmmm.” Al’s eyebrow got even more pointed, if that was possible. Annalise sighed, knowing that protesting too much was never a good defense. Annoyed, at herself more than Al, Annalise turned her back on Eve, poured herself another glass of wine and steered him back to gossip about his exploits around Cambridge. 

 

The party turned out to be an eclectic group of grad school strays from nearly everywhere but law that Al had gathered by sheer force of personality and charm, being a Southern belle with all the requisite home training and hospitality Annalise’s mother had tried to drill into her and that she had steadily and bluntly resisted. Annalise, try as she might, wasn’t immune to it either, and she soon found herself full of good home-cooked food and wine, grooving along to Earth, Wind and Fire. Al also had the trick of being so much the life of the party (and pouring with such a heavy hand) that even the most awkward dancer--which Annalise was not, thank you very much--forgot themselves and let loose. Annalise couldn’t help but notice, along with everybody else apparently, that Eve could shake it pretty well herself, spinning from partner to partner with abandon. It gave Annalise the same itch to step it up and command the floor that it did in the classroom, the urge to show everyone, show Eve, what she could do, not to underestimate her in her element. Maybe it was that feeling (along with the wine and Al’s teasing encouragement) but Annalise unbent in a way she hadn’t since she’d come to this cold city and really let loose like she would’ve at home in her mama’s living room. She wasn’t so into the groove that she didn’t notice Eve, red hair loose and swinging, crank it up a notch herself, and couldn’t help the flush of satisfaction it gave her. Eve had definitely noticed her looking and been looking herself, because she swept up to Annalise at the next song change and bowed extravagantly, extending her hand.

 

“May I have this dance?”

 

Annalise snorted. “I don’t know. Can you? I’m not sure you can keep up with me here, which should be a familiar feeling.”

 

Eve bounced up and grinned wickedly. “Oh I think I’ve been holding my own. Try me and see.” She made a little come at me gesture with her still outstretched hand.

 

Annalise, to her own surprise, took Eve’s hand, whooping as Eve pulled her in and then spun and dipped her in a single fluid move. She maintained eye contact all the way, even when she brought Annalise back up, well within her personal space. She slowly slid her arm from around Annalise and took her time letting go of her hand. Annalise laughed, still breathless from the contact as much as the sudden dip. She had to admire the sheer brazenness of Eve, the sharpness of her jawline and smile as cutting as her cross-examination skills, who made no bones about who she was and how she came to conquer. But Annalise wasn’t going to give in that easily. She cocked an eyebrow at her, pulled away, and busted out some of her best moves.

 

“Well, that’s a start, but what else have you got? Come on with it, now.”

 

It was Eve’s turn to laugh. “Oh, there’s plenty more where that came from.” 

 

And they were off. Their dance competition lit Annalise up like their class battles, trading moves and barbs that spurred both of them on to higher heights, the rest of the party circling around them clapping, until they called it quits and collapsed on the too-small couch in favor of more wine. 

 

“I didn’t know you could dance like that,” Eve said after they’d caught their breath and demolished another bottle of riesling. 

 

“There’s a lot of things you don’t know about me,” Annalise said, the words echoing with a little more meaning than she’d intended. Damn wine.

 

“Well, I’d like to get to know you better then,” Eve said, her voice dropping lower in response, the edge of innuendo flickering there, ready to be picked up but deniable.

 

But Annalise paused for a long breath, and she suddenly didn’t want to deny it, didn’t want to end the casual flirting they’d been doing all night. And that was sign enough that she needed to. This, this right here was a Thing that she didn’t need. Annalise hadn’t made it this far by letting down her guard, especially not over some white woman she went to law school with. She was used to knowing all the angles, planning everything out and watching people fall into her traps. She wasn’t used to fumbling, wrong footed like an inexpert witness in cross. No one was as sharp or dogged as her, but here Eve was. Here they were. 

 

Annalise recovered, said something inconsequential, she didn’t even know what, and they shifted gears into light chat about their lives and drank more wine but that was the start. 

 

Whenever Annalise thought about the real start of their relationship, whenever she thought back to the beginning, it was that moment when she knew she could be gone on her for real. 

 

***

 

Eve would say “do you remember,” and heaven help her she did, couldn’t help it no matter how she tried. No matter everything that came after, all the water and blood under the bridge, the bright golden thread of that memory and that feeling threaded through everything they were, spooled out from the beginning, stitched into and forever tugging at Annalise’s heart.


End file.
